Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model

Irrigated agriculture accounts for about 80% of total agricultural production in Pakistan, an arid country home to the sixth largest population globally. Almost all irrigated production takes place in the Indus Basin Irrigation System, the world's largest contiguous irrigated area. The extensive sys...

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Autores principales: Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework, Channa, Hira, Ringler, Claudia
Formato: Conference Paper
Lenguaje:Inglés
Publicado: 2016
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/10568/148631
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author Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework
Channa, Hira
Ringler, Claudia
author_browse Channa, Hira
Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework
Ringler, Claudia
author_facet Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework
Channa, Hira
Ringler, Claudia
author_sort Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework
collection Repository of Agricultural Research Outputs (CGSpace)
description Irrigated agriculture accounts for about 80% of total agricultural production in Pakistan, an arid country home to the sixth largest population globally. Almost all irrigated production takes place in the Indus Basin Irrigation System, the world's largest contiguous irrigated area. The extensive system of canals transfers water from the river system to distributaries and from there to watercourses, farms, and eventually to individual farm plots. Given growing water shortages and the resulting increased variability in water flows in the system, it will be important to improve system efficiency to ensure continued increase in agricultural production. A key question remains, however, where to intervene in the system. This paper uses multilevel modeling to explore the relative importance of plots, farms, watercourses, and distributaries on the levels and variance of wheat yield, and identify entry points to improve agricultural water management in a way that can guide prioritization of investments across the different levels of the irrigation network. Our findings suggest that out of the total variation in wheat yield that is not explained by plot specific characteristics, 28% is explained by distributary level effects, 3% by watercourse level effects, and 7% by farm (household) characteristics. These findings suggest that investments that improve irrigation water delivery at the distributary level provide the highest impact per unit of dollar invested in terms of reducing yield gaps among farmers.
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spelling CGSpace1486312025-11-06T07:16:46Z Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework Channa, Hira Ringler, Claudia capacity development irrigation productivity Irrigated agriculture accounts for about 80% of total agricultural production in Pakistan, an arid country home to the sixth largest population globally. Almost all irrigated production takes place in the Indus Basin Irrigation System, the world's largest contiguous irrigated area. The extensive system of canals transfers water from the river system to distributaries and from there to watercourses, farms, and eventually to individual farm plots. Given growing water shortages and the resulting increased variability in water flows in the system, it will be important to improve system efficiency to ensure continued increase in agricultural production. A key question remains, however, where to intervene in the system. This paper uses multilevel modeling to explore the relative importance of plots, farms, watercourses, and distributaries on the levels and variance of wheat yield, and identify entry points to improve agricultural water management in a way that can guide prioritization of investments across the different levels of the irrigation network. Our findings suggest that out of the total variation in wheat yield that is not explained by plot specific characteristics, 28% is explained by distributary level effects, 3% by watercourse level effects, and 7% by farm (household) characteristics. These findings suggest that investments that improve irrigation water delivery at the distributary level provide the highest impact per unit of dollar invested in terms of reducing yield gaps among farmers. 2016-06-10 2024-06-21T09:25:16Z 2024-06-21T09:25:16Z Conference Paper https://hdl.handle.net/10568/148631 en Open Access application/pdf Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework; Channa, Hira; and Ringler, Claudia. 2016. Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model. Selected Paper prepared for presentation at the Agricultural & Applied Economics Association's Annual Meeting, Boston, MA, July 31 - August 2, 2016. https://purl.umn.edu/235977
spellingShingle capacity development
irrigation
productivity
Mekonnen, Dawit Kelemework
Channa, Hira
Ringler, Claudia
Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model
title Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model
title_full Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model
title_fullStr Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model
title_full_unstemmed Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model
title_short Where to invest in the Indus Basin Irrigation System in Pakistan to improve land and water productivity? Insights from a hierarchical model
title_sort where to invest in the indus basin irrigation system in pakistan to improve land and water productivity insights from a hierarchical model
topic capacity development
irrigation
productivity
url https://hdl.handle.net/10568/148631
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